just bought a set of new style shimano deore levers of the classifieds and when ive opened up the resovior the fluid is clear, in my opinion shimano fluid is always pink, and the only fluid i know of thats clear is dot 4 or 5.

is there any way if i can tell if the fluid is mineral or dot 4 or 5?

and is it possible to clean them or flush them out before i connect my hose and caliper

asked the bloke i bought them off and he said he bought them of ebay and does’nt know

cheers

All Shimano brakes are mineral oil. It doesn’t have to be pink, it comes in lots of colours. A big bottle I got from Halfords is green 🙂

Just replace it if you’re concerned, it’s only a 2 minute job

i know all shimano brakes use mineral oil, thats why i want to know if the fluid thats in at the moment is the correct stuff

Not all mineral oil is pink – could be non-shimano fluid. Best way to be sure is to flush the old fluid out if you are concerned.

cheers and will just flushing it through move enough fluid as not too contaminate my calipers?

Give it a sniff, DOT fluid smells differently to Mineral.
But make sure you don’t inhale/drink any of it.

cheers and will just flushing it through move enough fluid as not too contaminate my calipers?

It’ll be fine – why the concern though?

cos i don’t wana contaminate my brakes, ive heard having even a bit of dot 4 in a system that uses mineral oil makes a balls of them

cheers everybody

cos i don’t wana contaminate my brakes, ive heard having even a bit of dot 4 in a system that uses mineral oil makes a balls of them

It can, the wrong fluid can make the seals swell up & fail.
Worth trying it though, you should soon be able to tell if something’s not right after you bleed it & put some pressure through it.

Probably not a cause for concern, lots of them come from Shimano with clear fluid in them, if it was the wrong stuff then it’d probably have screwed the seals by now.